


Chrysanthemums

by rosy_cheeks



Category: EXO (Band)
Genre: EXO - Freeform, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, One-Sided Love, Oneshot, Weird Narrator, but i love it, hanahaki, this gives me depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-19 21:44:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,076
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11322336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosy_cheeks/pseuds/rosy_cheeks
Summary: Let us go to a far off universe which not only takes us back in time, but also to a world of suffering. Poor Do Kyungsoo was hopeless at socializing and had no thought of ever speaking to the boy who crushed his heart every day without realization of the catastrophic damage achieved. Do Kyungsoo blamed him for the flowers blooming from his mouth, coated in saliva and grief and no will to change.





	Chrysanthemums

In a way, one could consider Kyungsoo’s life to be Kyungsoo’s fault. Everything that happened to him was a choice he didn’t make. He did make one choice though, he wanted to sing. So he did. He made it as far as his voice could take him, which was much farther than many, and he was grateful for the new lifestyle he was given. Unfortunately for him, life didn’t seem to like the idea of a content Kyungsoo. 

Kyungsoo was in love. Madly in love. Not because the boy was attractive, no, but because he was like no one he’d ever met. His smiled showed compassion and caring to everyone he flashed it toward. His actions were gentle compared to his toned body. Kyungsoo had never been treated with such kindness before, especially from a complete stranger. And a stranger he was living with. Rooming with. 

For someone who had fallen into an unrealistic love, he got exactly what unrealistic love gave. Kyungsoo was expecting a different change of events in his life, one that would move his life forward instead of back. So one morning when he trudged into the bathroom, he didn’t expect to cough chrysanthemum petals into the toilet. Kyungsoo was feeling weak and helpless. He knew what his flowers meant. They meant he was dying of neglect. 

With an aching throat and a heavy heart, Kyungsoo went about his day not telling anyone. Not that he talked to anyone in the first place. When his one and only, Jongin, asked him if he wanted to go out with the others that night, he shook his head and clutched his chest, announcing he wasn’t feeling the best. Kyungsoo went into his bed immediately after, curled his legs into his torso, and cried more tears than he had to shed. Kyungsoo might have hoped for a fantasy, but he was quite logical. 

For months he kept his disease a secret. Kyungsoo always took out the trash after he threw up in his and Jongin’s room and always made sure to flush what he could down the dreaded toilet that diagnosed him. He rarely said a word at group meals and interviews as his throat was clogged with the sweet scents of chrysanthemum. His love for Jongin, and therefore his deathly disease, only worsened as he spent more time with him. When Jongin slipped his hand onto the low of Kyungsoo’s back, Kyungsoo hurt. When Jongin smiled his breath-taking smile in Kyungsoo’s direction, Kyungsoo ached. When Jongin would lean in closer to Kyungsoo while watching movies in their shared bed, Kyungsoo only felt the chrysanthemums wrap around his heart and squeeze, hoping for his insides to explode and kill him faster than choking on petals ever could.

One day, when Kyungsoo was feeling especially sick of suffering, he decided to step out of the box he lived in. He was a surprisingly good cook and wanted to treat the group of boys to a homemade breakfast. After only a few minutes Jongin walked in to see what was smelling so heavenly. He smiled at Kyungsoo and Kyungsoo ached, but smiled back anyway. He told Jongin about his love for cooking and Jongin even offered to help. Kyungsoo swore he could have dropped dead right there on the kitchen floor. 

As for Kyungsoo’s disease, it was different. Kyungsoo had done a lot of research on other people’s cases and all of them had been close to their unrequited loves. And all of them survived, which gave Kyungsoo a sliver of hope. Kyungsoo’s case, however, took its sweet time with torturing him. His lungs were weak his breathing was shallow. It was suffocating and restraining. Kyungsoo wanted to go out with his group members, but found he nearly passed out just walking to the kitchen from his room. It was like walking backwards on a moving walkway, but slower than it was moving forward and even though Kyungsoo was pushing hard, his soul was just as tired as his legs. 

He was worn out. His love for Jongin was not winning the battle against his grief for knowing he didn’t find the capability to get to know him. His love for Jongin prevented him from feeling anything else besides pain. It hurt. While Kyungsoo’s fantasy said Jongin would heroically sweep him off his feet, reality told him he was going to fall face forward onto the kitchen floor one day soon.

It was lunch time when Kyungsoo felt the pain in his chest tighten unbearably. It hurt so much to breathe that he rarely took a breath. Trying desperately to search for help, Kyungsoo brushed one foot past the other in a successful attempt to make his way to the kitchen. All of the other boys were seated and eating and not noticing Kyungsoo’s troubled whimpers. 

He heard conversation. 

“If you’re really crushing on him that much, then just talk to him about it!” Chanyeol whined. 

“But it’s Kyungsoo. He obviously doesn’t like me back.”

It was Jongin. It was Jongin who had spoken. Kyungsoo wasn’t happy. Kyungsoo wasn’t relieved in the slightest to hear this. Kyungsoo was furious. 

Kyungsoo had gone nearly a year with agony riddling his heart. Kyungsoo was tired and aching from love and Jongin had done nothing. He wanted to shout. He wanted to scream. He wanted to end. His will to keep living every day only to see Jongin more was for nothing. Jongin had only kept his secrets bottled up. Kyungsoo wanted to laugh. He wanted to cry. He was feeling every emotion a human being could feel in one lifetime all at once. 

Jongin turned around in realization that Kyungsoo was behind him with a blush painted across his handsome face. Kyungsoo coughed a vicious cough and a few final chrysanthemum petals fell from his heart shaped lips and then he dropped onto the kitchen floor. Kyungsoo hated Jongin. 

In the end, Kyungsoo’s death was Kyungsoo’s fault. He had all the power in the world to cure his sickness. He could have seen a doctor. He could have talked to Jongin. Instead, he killed himself with stubbornness. 

Kyungsoo’s death was on the news for a week: Member of New Hot Boy Group Drops Dead of Hanahaki. Jongin cried for months, not sure how to react to a lost opportunity of happiness and never did Kyungsoo know how much he could have done for himself, if only he had tried.

**Author's Note:**

> I know I didn't use warnings for this, but it would just spoil the entire story! I didn't want people to scroll down the tag and be like "Oh look! Major character death! Well that guy is obviously going to die in the end." It spoils the story. 
> 
> I wanted to try something new with the narrator and I really hope it worked out okay. Feel free to leave a comment saying if you liked it or not (I intend to reply to every comment I get) and PLEASE leave constructive criticism. I need it. I'm taking a creative writing class next school year and I'm nervous because I know I'll once again be the youngest in the class.


End file.
